Page:The Complete Works of Lyof N. Tolstoi - 11 (Crowell, 1899).djvu/456

 they live in falsehood, but for a man, for any one with a heart which loves right, and hates wrong, and by reason has one purpose of distinguishing truth from falsehood, for such a man to be able to live in falsehood and evil, and to serve them, he must beforehand have shut his eyes to the truth, and continue to do the wrong which he loves. But all have the same kind of blinders: the historical perspective, the objective glance, worry about others, and the setting aside of the question of one's relation to goodness and truth.

This Aksakof is doing, this Soloviof is doing, this all the theologians are doing, this all the governmental people, the political economists, are doing, this is what all who live contrary to truth and goodness and who must justify themselves in their own hearts are doing.

"And this is the judgment, that the light is come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the light, for their works were evil. For every one that practises evil hates the light, and comes not to the light, lest his works should be reproved. But he that practises the truth comes to the light, that his works may be made manifest that have been wrought in God."

It is impossible to express this more clearly than it is said here. From this I draw this conclusion, that it is not necessary to fling pearls to these people, but that one must elaborate a certain relation to them in which our forces will not be wasted. Argument with them is not only an idle business, but injurious to our object. They provoke us by argument to something superfluous, incorrect; and, forgetting all that is most important in what you have said, they stick to this one thing. The relation to them which I try to cultivate in myself, and inculcate in others, is the same as my relation to a depraved drunken youth who should try to contaminate my sixteen-year-old son. I am sorry for this young libertine, but I do not try to reform him, because I know it is impossible. If I chide him, he will only turn me into ridicule before my son. I do not even forcibly remove my son from him, because my son will surely meet him